Handyman stole furnace from Ferndale house, police say

FERNDALE – A home-repair man faces charges that he stole a car and then stole part of a furnace at a house he was working on in Ferndale before he was arrested.

James Idzikowski, 36, of Milford is jailed on $50,000 bond and is due in Ferndale 43rd District Court for a pre-exam conference Thursday with co-defendant Jeremy Sweeney, 24, of Highland Park. Sweeney is in jail on $25,000 bond.

Both suspects are charged with breaking and entering with intent, a 10-year felony. Idzikowski is additionally charged with receiving and concealing a stolen motor vehicle, a five-year felony.

Idzikowski is a parolee and police said he is a longtime drug user who was given a chance to work on a vacant house in the 300 block Farmdale by the owner, who also lives in Milford.

“Apparently when the suspect is not doing drugs he is a good carpenter,” said Ferndale Police Detective John Thull. “The owner of the house knows the suspect and tried to give him a chance.”

Police said both suspects broke into the Farmdale Street house and stole a furnace shroud and duct work on Oct. 2.

Idzikowski stole the car, a Chevy Cobalt, a day earlier from a woman he knows in Green Oak Township in Livingston County, police said.

Police arrested both suspects on Eight Mile Road after a neighbor called police as they drove away from the house.

The owner of the house in late September had told several neighbors to call police if they saw Idzikowski at the house when the owner wasn’t there, police said.

The owner’s warning stemmed from an incident in late September when Idzikowski stole a number of carpenter’s tools from the house that belonged to the owner, police said.

“Idzikowski told the owner that a drug dealer took the tools from the house in lieu of money the suspect owed the drug dealer,” Thull said.

The owner went with Idzikowski to the drug dealer’s house in Detroit and bought the tools back for several hundred dollars, police said.

The owner later discovered a hot water heater and the heating core of the furnace had also been stolen from the house.